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In this study, we have evaluated the real-world conditions, the job outlook and the job satisfaction in the Biomedical Engineering (BME) sector in Greece on the basis of the experience of about 12% of the graduates of the BME Department of the University of West Attica, Greece. An anonymous online questionnaire, implemented on the Microsoft Forms platform using multiple choice questions, short text answers and Likert-based scales, became publicly available to the graduates of the BME department. About 12% of the department's graduates responded to the survey. Results show that the time to first employment is very fast for both men and women. About 51.4% of men and 69.4% of women find their first job employment in the BME sector even before their graduation. The internship is considered important for first job placement by more than 50.6% of participants. BME jobs are perceived as most interesting (73.6%), in a good environment (71.9%), with satisfactory career prospects (45.9%), with satisfactory monthly net salary (44.2%) and satisfactory working hours (52.8%). Men are mostly employed in Service (40.5%), whereas women are mostly employed in Sales (33.3%). Most graduates with BSc degree are employed in Service (39.1%) and Sales (21.8%), most graduates with MSc degree are employed in Service (34.6%) and Hospitals/Health care centers (21.2%), and most graduates with PhD degree are employed in Academia and R&D (62.5%). Most well-paid participants (>1500 euros net salary) were PhD holders (71.5%), followed by MSc holders (25%) and BSc holders (16.2%). Maximum monthly salaries were found for those with more than 10 years of experience. In terms of BME sector, most well-paid participants (>1500 euros monthly net salary) are those working with R&D (86.7%), Sales (86.7%) and Management (60%). There is a high demand for biomedical engineers in the labor market in Greece, despite the continuing economic recession that the country is suffering from the past 12 years.

Introduction: Data regarding the left atrial (LA) electroanatomical substrate in patients with hypertrophic cardiomyopathy (HCM) and atrial fibrillation (AF) are missing. In this electroanatomical mapping (EAM) study, we evaluated the extent of LA fibrosis and its impact on catheter ablation outcomes in patients with HCM and AF.Materials and Methods: High-density LA EAM was performed during AF in 28 consecutive patients with obstructive HCM and AF (42.9% displayed paroxysmal AF and 57.1% persistent AF). Propensity score (PS) matching analysis was performed to reduce the impact of potential confounding factors. PS were derived to match patients at a 1:1 ratio. Patients were matched according to age, sex and LA diameter. After PS, 28 non-HCM patients with AF were selected, and served as controls. Two different cut-off values of bipolar signal amplitude were investigated for fibrosis characterization (≤0.25 mV and ≤ 0.4 mV). HCM patients underwent pulmonary vein antral isolation (PVAI) and roof line, while non-HCM patients PVAI only.Results: After the 3-month blanking period, 10 HCM patients (35.7%) displayed atrial arrhythmia recurrence. HCM patients with arrhythmia recurrence showed significantly greater low voltage areas defined as either bipolar voltage ≤0.25 mV (22.5 ± 10% vs. 5.5 ± 6.4%, p = 0.001) or ≤ 0.4 mV (32 ± 13.9% vs. 5.9 ± 5.1%, p < 0.001). The presence of low voltage areas ≤0.4 mV greater than 14.1% of the total LA area also predicted arrhythmia recurrence with excellent sensitivity (100%) and specificity (100%). Univariate analysis revealed that the extent of LA fibrosis was the only predictor of AF recurrence. After PS matching with non-HCM patients, patients with HCM exhibited wider fibrotic regions ≤0.25 mV compared to non-HCM patients (p = 0.016).Conclusions: High-density EAM reveals extensive LA fibrotic disease in patients with HCM, an event with certain implications in catheter ablation outcomes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: The pathophysiological mechanism of focal atrial tachycardias (AT) remains obscure. Methods: Fifteen patients (6 males, age 45 ± 18) with focal AT underwent high‐density activation mapping using a new software called extended early‐meets‐late (EEML). Results: Irrespective of the arrhythmia mechanism, low bipolar voltage fractionated signals (0.14 ± 0.10 mV) were seen at the earliest activation site. The mean low‐voltage area (LVA) at the earliest activation site was 3.2 ± 1.0 cm2. EEML mapping revealed zones of conduction delay at the borders of LVAs. Conclusions: LVAs protected by zones of slow conduction appears to play an important role in the initiation and maintenance of focal ATs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Fasciculoventricular accessory pathways are rare variants of preexcitation. The differential diagnosis of fasciculoventricular accessory pathways from other preexcitation variants can be challenging. Based on two cases, we discuss the specific electrocardiographic and electrophysiologic features of fasciculoventricular bypass tracts. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Data regarding the successful ablation site of idiopathic outflow tract (OT) ventricular arrhythmias (VAs) in the modern era of mapping and ablation are limited.Methods and Results: Over a 4-year period, a total of 309 patients underwent detailed activation mapping of OT VAs including the right ventricular outflow tract (RVOT), the left ventricular outflow tract (LVOT) and the aortic cusps (AC), and the coronary venous system. 244 cases were successfully ablated at the index procedure (78.9%). The successful ablation site was more frequently located at the LVOT/ACs (51.6%) followed by RVOT (36.2%). In particular, the ACs was the predominant successful ablation site of idiopathic OT VAs (46.7%). An epicardial site of origin was predictor of ablation failure (p < 0.05).Conclusions: The ACs is the predominant successful ablation site of idiopathic OT VAs.Take-home Message: The aortic cusps are the predominant successful ablation site of idiopathic idiopathic outflow tract ventricular arrhythmias. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The study of eye movements has been increasing over the past decade. It is considered that eye movements, mainly saccades and blinks, provide significant information for cognitive and visual processes of the observers. Saccades and blinks are high velocity eye movements. In this paper, the automatic identification of saccades and blinks, as well as their onset and offset, is proposed based on a novel implementation of nonlinear dynamics using the Largest Lyapunov Exponent and the logarithm of the divergence. The Largest Lyapunov Exponent detection method was tested on 25,000 saccades and 2,366 blinks, detecting with high accuracy and precision both types of eye movements. The Largest Lyapunov Exponent detection method was compared against two other existing techniques for blink and saccade identification, showing advantageous performance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]